3. Clash of Stone and Steel #2
Even worse had been the day he’d learned his mental limits.
Morland had been able to take over his mind because he’d never worked all that much on strengthening his mind shield when he was younger.
He’d been arrogant and always assumed his physical strength would get him out of trouble, but it had taken Morland mere seconds to get past his rudimentary mind shield on the battlefield that day, and then his mind had no longer been his own.
Morland had controlled him as easily as a puppeteer, and Samhail vowed later it would never happen again.
He’d enlisted Bressen to help him strengthen his mind shield, but there too he’d pushed himself beyond his limits.
He remembered making Bressen attack his shield harder and harder until his friend had refused to push any more.
Samhail hadn’t slept in days by that point, and he’d lashed out, crazed with desperation, and attacked Bressen himself.
He’d woken up three days later with no further memory of what had happened.
He suspected Bressen had crashed through his mind shield and rendered him unconscious, forcing him to get the much-needed rest he’d been denying himself, but he’d never asked Bressen exactly what happened, and Bressen never offered.
So yes, Samhail recognized and understood that look in Cyra’s eyes.
She’d moved her training time with Axenus to an hour earlier to get more time to work on her magic, and she’d pushed Samhail to extend their lessons longer and longer each day.
She was now training for more than four hours straight every morning.
He’d have to ask Bressen if she was sleeping at all, because he suspected she wasn’t.
In any case, he wasn’t going to let her burn out like he had.
“We’re done for today,” Samhail said using a tone that normally made seasoned warriors shiver. Cyra only glared at him.
He turned to Yarris and jerked his head toward the door. “Thanks for your help, Yarris. We’ll see you here tomorrow.”
Yarris spared only a quick glance at Cyra before mumbling a ‘Yes, sir’ to Samhail and turning again to bow to her. “My lady,” the man said as he scurried past her out of the yard.
“We’re done,” Samhail said to her again. “It’s time for lunch.”
“I’m the lady here, and I’ll say when we’re done,” she snapped back.
Samhail arched a brow. Cyra wasn’t the type to pull rank, so the fact she’d just tried told him just how far out of herself she really was. It was time to rein her back in.
“I don’t care if you’re the Hand of the Nemesis or the Queen of Arystria or whatever other titles you’re using nowadays. They mean nothing in this training yard,” he told her. “In this yard, I’m in charge, and I say you’re done for today.”
Her eyes narrowed at him, and he knew even before her body tensed she’d taken it as a challenge.
“Cyra,” he warned.
She ignored his tone and launched herself at him, blunted practice sword raised.
Samhail sighed and dodged her first two swipes with the sword, which only enraged her.
She pulled back the blade again and swung it across her body with all her might, clearly forgetting everything he’d taught her about leaving herself open.
He pulled back again, just out of reach of the blade, and Cyra nearly spun herself around as the strike she expected to make didn’t stop her momentum.
With her back to him now, Samhail lunged forward and grabbed her around the shoulders to pull her back against his chest. He knocked the sword out of her hand with a quick blow to her wrist and then lifted her off the ground so her feet dangled in the air.
Cyra screamed her frustration as she found herself immobilized and weaponless.
She struggled against him, trying to jerk and wiggle free, but he only tightened his hold on her until she grunted.
“Let go of me!” she screamed.
“Yield,” he said calmly.
“Never!”
Samhail was about to chuckle at her stubbornness when he realized he was suddenly holding empty air. He whirled around, looking for Cyra in the training yard as panic rolled over him.
“Cyra! Where are you?” he called to her. He stopped as he spotted her near the weapons rack pulling another sword from it.
“What the fuck just happened?” he asked, more to himself than her.
Cyra didn’t answer, but suddenly she was in front of him again, swinging the new sword.
He blinked in surprise, but this time he simply put up a hand and caught the blade in mid-swing as Cyra tried to slash at him.
The sting of the metal on his palm hurt only for a second before his hand closed around the blunted blade so she couldn’t swing it again.
“Let go!” she yelled as she tugged at the sword.
“Since when can you port?” he asked her.
“I discovered it on the ship after we found The Stalwart,” she answered, still pulling at the sword.
“Who did you syphon it from?” he asked more urgently.
“I don’t know!”
She was still trying to jerk the sword from his hand, but he pulled it from her instead and chucked it across the yard.
“Cyra, stop right now, or this will be our last training session.”
She stopped instantly, her eyes going wide. She shook her head. “Samhail, no, please…”
Samhail swore loudly as tears gathered in her eyes, but she stepped back from him and wiped furiously at them.
“I’m fine,” she said, still wiping the moisture away.
“You’re not fine,” he said gently, “but no one expects you to be after what happened.”
She looked away from him, but he saw the tears threaten in her eyes again and sighed. He stepped toward her and brushed a thumb across her cheek. It was perhaps too tender a gesture to make out in the open as they were, but he didn’t care. He hated seeing her upset.
“Would…a hug help?” he asked.
Her gaze snapped to his in disbelief. “You’re actually offering a hug?”
“Only for the next five seconds,” he said, “so if you want one…”
She threw herself into his arms and laid her head on his chest. Mercifully, it didn’t sound like she was crying, and Samhail wrapped his long arms around her. He put a hand on her head and held her for a moment before she finally pulled back from him.
“Thank you,” she said. “I’m sorry for attacking you.”
“I’ve been where you are before. I understand,” he said. “If you need to work out your frustrations, that’s fine. We can do that.”
She looked at him as if seeking clarification of what he meant, so he added, “In the training yard. But I won’t let you push yourself to exhaustion and burnout. Recovery time is as important as training time.”
She crossed her arms. “I remember being told a few months ago we don’t always get to fight under ideal conditions, that sometimes it’s a good idea to see what your body is capable of when you’re not at your best.”
Samhail frowned. “These are very different circumstances. You aren’t just tired, you’re exhausted, mentally and physically.
At some point you do need to take a break.
In fact, those are your orders for the afternoon.
Take a nap. Read a book. I don’t care, just spend the rest of the afternoon resting, or I’m canceling our training session for tomorrow, and I’ll have Axenus cancel his with you as well. ”